The Philadelphia Flyers took some 51 hours to obliterate all that, and bring the series down to a best-of-three.

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The Flyers bolted from the gate before clinging to a 5-3 victory in a physical Game 4 Friday night, handing the Blackhawks their first back-to-back losses of the postseason and evening the series, with Game 5 set for Sunday night in Chicago.

In a playoff year in which home ice seemed almost meaningless through the first three rounds, the Flyers have been a powerhouse in front of their orange-clad faithful, who came in record numbers for the second straight game and Friday night passed the million mark in attendance for 2009-10. They have seen seven straight home wins from their Flyers, who are 9-1 in the playoffs on Broad Street and have not lost here since their Game 3 defeat in Round 2 put them in an 0-3 hole against the Bruins.

And they are guaranteed one final show when the series returns here on Wednesday night with the Stanley Cup in the house - all of which makes the awakening of Mike Richards and Philadelphia's top line come not a moment too soon.

The Flyer captain scored his first of the series 4:35 in, one of three Philly goals in the first period, and Ville Leino banked in a wounded duck off Kris Versteeg's back to build a 4-1 Philly lead at 6:43 of the third. The Flyers needed that one, because Dave Bolland (5-on-3) and Brian Campbell brought Chicago within a goal with 4:10 to play before Richards' linemate Jeff Carter poured ice on that rally with an empty-netter 24.6 seconds from the end.

"It's nice to take part in the series," Richards said, words that folks in Chicago are still waiting to hear from their own young captain. Jonathan Toews, caught too high on Claude Giroux's wide-open tap-in in the last minute of the first period, remains stuck on one assist in the series, and Chicago's top trio has combined for five points in the four games - Dustin Byfuglien has gone missing and Patrick Kane was a miserable minus-4 last night.

"We're not happy," said Hawks defenseman Duncan Keith, who had three assists. "But we're going to look at some positives. We're going home. We have two of the next three games in our building and we feel good about that."